Saturday, November 10, 2012

Quotable - stand your ground

Meanwhile, the president is in a far stronger position than in previous confrontations. I don't place much stock in talk of "mandates," but Obama did win re-election with a populist campaign, so he can plausibly claim that Republicans are defying the will of the American people. And he just won his big election and is, therefore, far better placed than before to weather any political blowback from economic troubles -- especially when it would be so obvious that these troubles were being deliberately inflicted by the GOP in a last-ditch attempt to defend the privileges of the 1 percent.

Most of all, standing up to hostage-taking is the right thing to do for the health of America's political system.

So stand your ground, Mr. President, and don't give in to threats. No deal is better than a bad deal.